


The Last Falling Star

by day_dream_girl



Category: EastEnders (TV)
Genre: Hurt Ben Mitchell, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Protective Callum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-06-24 18:32:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19729375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/day_dream_girl/pseuds/day_dream_girl
Summary: Callum dealing with what happened between Ben and his brother at Pride.





	The Last Falling Star

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a long time since I've written anything, and even longer since I've watched EE. I've never written M/M before, but these two are puling at my heartstrings and this kept annoying me until I wrote it down. This was written very quickly and wasn't beta'd so all mistakes are mine.

“Got a pint in for ya,” Stuart tells him, sipping from his own glass. Callum sits, staring at the table top until his brother’s bandaged hand comes into view.

“Lost my phone the other night,” Callum tells him shakily.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Showed up out the back the next morning when we was clearing up.”

“That’s good then, innit?” Stu huffs.

“Thing is,” Callum replies, throat dry, “it wasn’t there the night before when I checked. I’m sure of it. Like it just magically appeared.”

Stu shrugs, eyes wide and all too innocent looking. “Least you got back, hey. That’s all that matters.”

Callum can feel it rising, that uneasiness inside, and his fingers tap restlessly against the glass. 

“D’you hear what happened? To Ben?”

“Yeah,” Stu snorts, “probably deserved it. Disgusting the way some people behave, strutting round, harassing people. Maybe it’ll make him think twice before-” he cuts himself off and glances around the bar.

“Before what?” Callum asks, eyes burning, and brow furrowed.

“People like him, always causing trouble.”

Callum stares at him, and can feel a muscle beneath his eye ticking. “What happened your hand?”

“Accident at work,” Stuart shrugs.

Callum turns away, hands clenching around the still full glass. “D’you think I’m thick?”

“What?”

“You heard me. Do you think I’m thick?”

“Callum, I ain’t got-”

“I told you about. About Ben,” his voice is low and shaking with anger. “My phone goes missing, you go missing, Ben gets beat up, your hands bandaged and he’s not letting me see him.”

“See him? What you want to see him for? All he does is confuse you!”

Callum let out an incredulous laugh. “That’s what you’re focused on? Y’aint even going to deny it, are ya?”

His brother’s face closes down. “I was tryin’ to protect ya. Scum like that? They ruin everything. You got it good, everything going for ya. You don’t need him mucking you about!”

“I don’t,” Callum shakes his head, “I don’t believe this. Ben didn’t hurt me. He didn’t force me to-“ Callum takes a steadying breath. “I told you he was more than a mate. And you-" his brows furrow, “you could’ve killed him!” 

He looks him up and down. “God, there’s not even a mark on ya. What’d you do, eh? Jump him from behind? Make sure he couldn’t fight back?” he spits, eyes stinging.

“Course not,” his brother growls. “I ain’t like that.”

Callum scoffs, hands shaking.

“He wouldn’t fight me,” Stuart eventually mumbles.

“You what?” Callum stares at him, Stu’s eyes moved around the bar. “He wouldn’t fight you,” he repeats flatly, “so you just kept pounding him, that it? God, I can’t,” he breaks off, throat closing, “I can’t even look at ya!”

“Callum, I did it for you,” his brother replies, not an ounce of remorse on his stony face.

“No,” he shakes his head, “no, you didn’t do it for me. I thought, I thought we were getting somewhere. I thought you were different, better than Dad. But this.” He stands abruptly, needing to be away, anywhere away from this pub and his brother.

“Cal-”

“No, you stay away from me! I don’t want ya anywhere near me. If you’ve any sense, you’ll disappear, cos Phil Mitchell will be booking your funeral when he finds out.”

He storms out without another word, fists clenched, head thumping and sick to his stomach.  
___________________________________________

The door opens quickly, after only one knock.

“Oh, Callum,” Jay says in obvious relief at seeing him there, “Thank God. I gotta go, but his Mum will kill me if I leave him alone. Look after him for a bit, yeah?”

“Uh, sure.”

Jay smiles, slapping him on the shoulder as he brushes past him. 

“Oi! Where’s my orange juice?” 

Callum gets the drink without a word and stands at the door to the living room, staring at the back of Ben’s head. He’s lying across the couch, a pillow cushioning his head, and the TV playing some day time court room drama.

Ben glances at the glass placed on the table in front of him, “’bout time you-” his words disappear as his eyes find Callum’s, already red and glassy looking.

“Well, well,” he swallows turning off the television, “you here to play nurse then?”

Callum looks down, away from the swollen eye, bruised and cut face. “Shut up,” he whispers, sitting down on the coffee table, “came to see how you were, since you been ignoring my texts.”

“Well, ain’t exactly at my most photogenic these days. Don’t wanna spoil the illusion for my adoring public.” Ben smirks.

“I’m sorry, Ben.”

He shrugs, barely containing the wince at the movement, “what you got to be sorry for? Just picked up the wrong bloke, is all. It happens.”

“Ben, I, I,” Callum drops his head into his hands in frustration.

“Honestly Callum,” Ben murmurs confusion on his face, “I’m flattered you’re so obviously concerned for by wellbeing.”

“Just stop it, alright,” Callum glares at him, eyes shining, mouth a harsh line. “I know, alright? I know this is...Stuart did this to ya.”

Ben shifts back, smile sliding from his face, “yeah, well, seems your brother is a bit obsessed with me, didn’t wanna make ya jealous.”

Callum’s eyes close, his insides turning and twisting, making his heart race and blood pump throughout his entire body. “This is all my fault,” he finally says, a tear escaping that he hastily wipes away.

Ben holds his gaze steadily, his voice even and flat. “Did you send him after me?”

“What? No! Course not,” Callum’s frustrated and flustered, fidgeting and trying to contain everything, to not explode, and scream at him. How could he think that, why would he...

A cool hand slides into his, unclenching the strained muscles in his fingers, holding him firm, grounding him, letting him breathe easier.

“Then you ain’t got nothing to apologise for,” Ben tells him softly.

Callum shakes his head, tears running down his cheeks, “I told him, t-told him you was more than a mate. I shoulda known he’d-” he squeezes Ben’s hand, and runs his gaze down his body. “And now look at ya. Christ.”

“Hey, you only interested in me for my looks, that it?” Ben teases, a smirk on his still too handsome face.

Callum can’t help but huff a laugh, unable to stop the giddy feeling that bubbles up when he’s around Ben. “Shut up!” 

Quiet settles around them, an air of comfort and peace, Callum’s hand encircling Ben’s while his thumb draws lazy circles across his knuckles. Callum can’t help but think he’s beautiful. Even painted shades of red, purple and blue, Ben is still a beautiful man that few men, or women, could hold a light to. 

Callum wants to stay here, to wrap this moment up and take it with him always. Or better yet, never leave, just stay, the two of them, quiet.

Ben could so easily have been gone, ripped away from this cold, horrible world, never to be seen again. Callum can’t imagine a world without Ben in it, the square without the cheeky bad boy, smirking across the bar with his flirty comments and innuendos driving him to distraction. 

He keeps Callum on his toes, nearly always in a bad way, but he can’t imagine him not being there. And it kills him that he nearly lost it, and at the hands of his own brother. 

“Why’d you do it?” he finally whispers, realising that while he’s been staring at Ben, Ben has been staring right back. “Why’d you just let him beat ya like that?”

Ben sighs, and pulls his eyes away from Callum, gazing at the ceiling above him. “I’m sick of fighting. I’m not ashamed of who I am, Callum, and I ain’t apologising to anyone for it. Besides, I thought he might end up taking it out on you if things didn’t go the way he wanted.” 

He glances at Callum, “I know he’s all the family you got left, now that Daddy’s crawled back into his hole. Don’t want to be responsible for you losing him as well.”

Callum feels his head shaking before Ben has even finished speaking. “No, that’s, that’s not your decision. Stuart’s done as far as I’m concerned. Told him to stay away from me and I mean it.”

Ben sighs, and shifts around on the couch, “looks worse than it is, anyway. Cuts and bruises will fade soon enough; fractured ribs will take a bit longer but, hey, no internal injuries, so glass half full, right?”

Callum grasps both his hands in his, voice shaking, “don’t do it again,” he insists, “ya gotta promise me, you won’t do it again.”

“Callum-”

“No, I mean it Ben. I can’t, I can’t have you not be safe. I need to know you’re ok. I don’t care who it is, if it’s Dad or Stuart or anyone else, I need you to fight back, I need you to be alright.”

Ben’s tongue darts out quickly and he looks at Callum’s face reverently. “Worried about me, are ya?”

Callum feels his head drifting closer to Ben’s until Ben is nearly all he can see. “Yeah, as it happens, I am. I’m a mess,” he admits softly, “I dunno what I’m at, what’s going on, but I know I need you to be ok. It’s the most important thing to me, Ben. Cos, this thing I’m, I’m going through? “he can feel his lips trembling, “I can’t do it if you ain’t here. I’m selfish, I know that, but I need you here to help me. I need,” he takes a breath. “I just need you.”

A tear runs down Ben’s cheek and Callum’s thumb catches it, his fingers lightly kissing the tender skin beneath his fingertips. 

Ben clears his throat, working his jaw for a few moments before speaking. “So,” he eventually says with false bravado, “this mean you’re really here to kiss it all better after all?”

Callum sees through him, through the bravado, the pain to the vulnerability inside, his eyes delving into Ben’s and seeing _him_. He leans forward and brushes his lips against the blossoming red cheek, the grazed forehead and the cut at the corner of his mouth. 

Ben’s breath catches and he stares wide eyed at Callum, hardly daring to breathe in case it shatters the moment.

“Promise me,” Callum whispers, forehead pressed against Ben, voice pleading.

He feels Ben agree in the nod of his head, and a rattling sigh escaping his lungs. Callum clutches him tighter, mindful of his injuries. He knows he’s being selfish and greedy, but at that moment he doesn’t care, not if it means Ben will still be there. Callum needs Ben, he can’t let him go.


End file.
